IEEE study points to micro-transfer printing for silicon photonics

Silicon photonics is gaining attention as a way to ease bandwidth and latency constraints in computing systems by moving data with photons rather than electrons. The technology is already used in photonic integrated circuits, especially in telecom and datacom applications, and is being explored for future AI infrastructure as conventional electrical interconnects become a system performance bottleneck.

A new IEEE study highlights micro-transfer printing as a promising method for heterogeneous integration, one of the key challenges facing silicon photonics. By enabling multiple material systems to be combined more flexibly, the technique could expand the functionality of silicon photonics and support more advanced photonic systems.